Prater providing little/no advantage on kickoffs Lard

Douglas LeeDec 26, 2012 8:30 AM

Good Morning, Broncos fans! Prior to Sunday's game, we checked on Matt Prater's statistics from this season, and what we found wasn't pretty.

Prater's not only been struggling with inaccuracy on field goals, but is allowing teams better starting position following kickoffs than teammates are, at least in the mile high confines of SAF@MH. You know - where Prater is supposed to be blasting touchbacks on every try. Sunday's visit from Josh Cribbs did nothing to help Prater's numbers.

What about on the road? Let's take a look.

Just to clarify our data, and this applies to the home numbers as well, we've excluded all onside kicks, squibs, and kicks by Britton Colquitt.

Away from Denver, on regular kickoffs, Prater has permitted opponents an average starting field position of the 21.98-yard line. Although Prater has kicked plenty of touchbacks on the road (19/40, 47.5%), he allowed multiple long returns in each game at San Diego, Cincy, and Baltimore.

Thanks to Trindon Holliday, the Broncos have gotten better field position than their opponents on the road, starting at the 23.50-yard line on average.

Omar Bolden had handled kickoffs for the first several weeks of the season, with extremely poor results. On 15 road returns, Bolden failed to bring the ball out to the 20 on five occasions, and provided Denver an average start of the 19.73-yard line.

Holliday has been electric, with his 105-yard touchdown return at Cincinnati boosting Denver's average start with him returning to the 26.82-yard line. That even includes Trindon letting the ball die at the one-yard line in that same game.

Opposing kickers have gained touchbacks on 15 of 32 (46.9%) attempts, which is almost exactly what Prater's done.

Combining home and road data (including the Browns game), Denver has started, on average, from its own 21.38-yard line following kickoffs. Opponents, following kickoffs by Prater, have started at their 21.17-yard line on average.

Admittedly, we're not dealing with huge samples here, and electric returners like Holliday, Jacoby Jones, and Josh Cribbs serve to skew the figures a bit.

But taken with those grains of salt, these figures show us that the overstated strength of Matt Prater's leg hasn't been offering the Broncos much of an advantage on kickoffs this year, if at all.

His kickoffs have essentially been matched by Denver's opponents; he's among the least accurate FG kickers in the league, for the second year in a row.

So, he's really good from 50 yards and out. But as a Bronco, he's only attempted five of those per year on average. It doesn't seem like there's enough value there to make up for his shortcomings.

If long field goals are where he sets himself apart from others, but that comes at the expense of missing shorter attempts, and there's no distinct advantage on kickoffs, then is Matt Prater worth keeping around at all, especially at one of the highest kicker salaries in the league?

It would be hard enough to vouch for Prater's worth if he were paid half or a third of what he's getting. At $4.25M this season, it's a no-brainer to say he's not been worth his salary, and not worth keeping around beyond 2012.

Broncos

John Fox says he won't pull the plug on either Holliday or Jim Leonhard after each muffed a punt on Sunday.

As noted by Jeff Legwold, the Patriots will likely be unable to run their offense as quickly as they did Week 5 in a rematch, since it would probably take place in Denver.

However, the Broncos figure to be operating at a faster pace, what with their growing comfort level with each other on offense.

Mike Klis wonders if a SB run could make it harder for teams to hire away Mike McCoy and Jack Del Rio for head gigs. Only one way to find out...

Demaryius Thomas and Eric Decker top the league in third-quarter touchdowns. Halftime adjustments, or chance?

The other thing is, it looked like Dreesen played twice as much as Tamme did on Sunday, but Peyton went out of his way this past week to pump up Tamme. Has Dreesen leapfrogged Tamme? Maybe the number on the depth chart isn't even important at this point.

Posted by vcbronco on 2012-12-26 17:18:09

Hi Doug, I had question on the participation data. After the Baltimore game I thought DJ was being phased in as the Mike, Brooking played like 7 snaps in Baltimore. But after the Cleveland, it looked like DJ only played a handful of snaps, and Trevathan is coming the field ahead of the odd man out between DJ/Brookings. Is DJ/Brookings being driven by the opposing team RB? Maybe becuase Rice is such a good receiver out of the backfield thehy had DJ out there instead of Brookings. But that doesn't make sense either b/c Trent Richardson has like 50 receptions or so. Maybe the opposing TE package is what is driving Del Rio's personnel.

Thoughts? BTW, if may have been me, but if seemed like the Cleveland TE had a good day over the middle of the day, I don't think Brookings can be out there in the playoffs.

Posted by vcbronco on 2012-12-26 17:04:49

The next time Prater misses an OT or a 4th-quarter FG in a close game will be his first. Kind of important, given how many potential game-winning kicks have been missed by other kickers this year. Prater hasn't had any game-winning or game-saving chances this year, and I'm not as confident in him right now. Still, he doesn't fold under pressure.

He's in a group of about 10 kickers at the highest salaries (3-4 are paid more, the rest are pretty equal to Prater). The money is not a big issue.

(Jason Elam's career FG perentage: 80.7%. Would you pay him?).

Posted by billyricky on 2012-12-26 15:45:51

It's seemed for a while now that the only constraints upon Denver have related to cash, not cap. They should be fine as far as room goes, and Prater isn't due any more guaranteed money.

Maybe giving Prater a big contract was part of John Elway's plan to get Fox to go for it on 4th down more often. Getting a better kicker would just make it easier to kick FGs.

If the Broncos do upgrade, I hope the dead money from Prater's contract doesn't cost us the chance to sign free agents or resign our own.

Posted by A R on 2012-12-26 13:32:21

Hopefully Von Miller wants maximum wins in his career, not maximum cash. Not that Denver won't pay him, but if he ever hits the open market. Granted it was Buffalo, but look how much Mario Willimans got. I'm not fond of the Indy model of tying up cap space in a couple stars at the expense of the rest of the roster.

Posted by A R on 2012-12-26 13:27:03

I get it, AldenBrown , but the fact is this "still talking about it" is one comment, when he was asked a specific question about this player. He's not running around trying to find reporters to take down the story about how he really wants to play with AS.

Sensationalistic PFT takes that one comment... and turns it into a headline. Silly.

Posted by Sam on 2012-12-26 12:53:14

I'm with you Tom. I get that Prater has some strangely bad juju in the 40 yard range. He is also making insane money for a kicker. However, the data provided for field position as too many other factors to lay at the foot (pun intended) of Matt Prater.

Posted by RyanHennigan on 2012-12-26 11:59:00

Sam, yes, that's true, but Von is still talking about it now. That's why it's in the PFT story. What would you rather hear: Von saying that, or saying what Rahim Moore did on draft day: "I'm going to be a Bronco for life"?

Posted by AldenBrown on 2012-12-26 11:58:39

Certainly, the coverage teams factor.

My point is just to show that Prater doesn't offer some advantage via touchbacks over the opposition, and therefore doesn't have some sort of enhanced value.He plays at altitude, and when teams come to Denver, the opposing kickers reap the same benefits.

The only thing Prater *seems* to do better than other kickers is make 50+ yarders. But again, there's the influence of the altitude, and opposing kickers make lots of bombs in Denver too.

Posted by Douglas Lee on 2012-12-26 11:57:57

Crap like that is why the NBA has become such a joke of a league.

Posted by Yahmule on 2012-12-26 11:38:19

Interesting link, Alden. Hard to see it happening in the NFL given the restraints like the franchise tag, assuming each guy gets to the end of their contracts as a superstar without injury.

Posted by TJ Johnson on 2012-12-26 11:34:33

A question about Prater's stat (average return starting position of about the 22 yard line): doesn't the performance of the entire kick team factor into that, and not just Prater's leg? His touchback % is similar to the opposition, which doesn't suggest anything. His field goal accuracy sucks, so I'll agree he has issues there (I still maintain that the Broncos should evaluate and have their kickers practice at low altitude, even during the season). But, if the average starting field position includes the run back, then that stat includes the entire kick team's performance, too. Any way of separating the two?

Posted by John Tomasik on 2012-12-26 11:31:34

You guys do realize that they probably talked about it briefly in the green room at the draft, or during the combine, right?

Such a non-story, of course it's on PFT.

Posted by Sam on 2012-12-26 11:18:16

This is the first comment by Von that I ever immdeiatly disliked. It just kinda sounds like he could be looking for a new team at some point. The thought makes me violently ill.

Posted by Luke Chaney on 2012-12-26 11:12:33

I see Von is talking about wanting to do a LeBron/Wade/Bosh thing and joining Marcel Dareus and Aldon Smith. Hopefully he means in Denver.http://profootballtalk.nbcspor...